In roadway construction, in particular in the case of maintenance work on road surfaces, “surface milling machines” are often used for processing the road surface or the surface substrate. Such surface milling machines include, in particular, cold road milling machines such as those described in DE102012022879A1 and DE 102012012607A1, to which reference is made here. These surface milling machines mill the surface of the substrate to the desired milling depth using a milling drum, which results in the generation of milled material such as asphalt granulate. However, this milled material is often not intended to remain on site, but rather to be transported elsewhere. For this purpose, the surface milling machine usually has a conveying device with which the milled material generated during the milling process can be transferred to a transport vehicle, which is generally a transport truck such as a dump truck with a 16 ton load capacity. Depending on the alignment of the conveying device on the surface milling machine in relation to the working direction A, the transport vehicle typically either drives in front of or behind the surface milling machine. However, as the surface milling machine only moves very slowly in the working direction during the milling process, it is necessary for the driver of the transport vehicle alternately to drive a short distance forward and then wait until the surface milling machine has “caught up” with it again. The transport vehicle therefore does not move at an even speed, but rather moves back and forth relative to the surface milling machine. When the maximum load of the transport vehicle is reached, it must be replaced with another transport vehicle. This replacement procedure has the result that a transport vehicle is not available to receive the milled material for a significant amount of time. As the surface milling machine in continuous operation would continue to produce milled material, an undesirable downtime of the surface milling machine is the result. This situation is made even more acute when only one lane of the roadway is available for the entire working procedure, as is often the case with maintenance work on partially blocked highways with parallel traffic. This downtime of the surface milling machine means a substantial loss of productivity and thus substantial loss of profit, which can be particularly drastic in the case of long milling paths. Moreover, this procedure renders a complicated driving pattern necessary for the transport vehicle during loading, which demands a high level of concentration from both the driver of the surface milling machine as well as from the driver of the transport vehicle.
It is thus the object of the present invention to provide a way of improving the working operation of the surface milling machine.